Planning chiefs are being urged to keep congestion in mind when deciding whether to approve a 44-home development in Shavington, writes Stephen Topping.
Cheshire East Council’s southern planning committee will consider a reserved matters planning application from Wainhomes for the development on land behind Chestnut Avenue.
Officers have recommended the scheme for approval in a report issued ahead of Wednesday’s meeting.
But the report says residents believe Chestnut Avenue would struggle to cope with extra traffic from lorries during construction.
In the report Cllr Steven Edgar, Conservative member for Shavington, calls for a condition to stop lorries parking on the road outside the site after residents had raised their concerns to him.
“Chestnut Avenue is narrow and it is on a bus route – it is barely wide enough for two HGVs to pass each other,” he said.
“HGVs at other building sites regularly arrive early, before work is allowed to commence.
“Parking on Chestnut Avenue and Vine Tree Avenue will be very unsafe and destroy the grass verges.”
An unnamed Crewe PCSO also raises the issue in the same report, stating that residents had approached the police with their concerns.
“Please can the utmost priority be given to ensure there is sufficient off-road parking for all works vehicles to minimise any obstruction to the highways,” the PCSO added.
Shavington Parish Council has also called for ‘all large commercial vehicles’ to be stopped from parking on the road while work is ongoing, along with a ‘firm condition’ to limit the hours of work.
Wainhomes wants to build six one-bedroom properties, eight two-bedroom homes, six three-bedroom homes, 21 four-bedroom properties and three five-bedroom homes on the site.
Outline planning permission for the site was granted in December 2016, after the planning inspectorate overturned CEC’s rejection to the plans at appeal.
Cheshire East officers are calling for 13 of the properties to be available as affordable homes, while the council will ask Wainhomes for a £45,500 contribution towards special educational needs provision if the scheme is approved.
In recommending the scheme, officers said that the mix of housing, provision for open space and impact on highways and the environment would all be acceptable.
All the new housing developments in the Crewe and Nantwich area are placing an unacceptable pressure on existing infrastructure. Roads cannot accommodate the increases in peak time traffic flows; traffic light controls are generally much less efficient than they could be and no consideration appears to have been given to the cumulative impact of all the different schemes. Each one may have a relatively small impact, which the existing roads have the capacity to deal with, but once you start to add them together…
We wait and wait for a co-ordinated traffic and car parking policy in Nantwich.